| OCR Text |
Show EETTER-'iEALTH BATTLE Tireless in Services Advancing Cause of Freedom from Human Suffering. Not alone in preparedness for emergencies, emer-gencies, but in a tireless offensive battle for better health is the American Ameri-can Red Cross nurse maintaining in pesce time the high tradition of her war service. As in war, the same self-effacing service for humanity goes on its quiet, effective way content con-tent in Its accomplishments, seeking no public acclaim. Enrolled in the Red Cross Nursing Service are 40.636 of these missioners of health, nearly 1,000 carrying the message of a finer public health to as many communities communi-ties and 1.100 teaching large classes in home hygiene and care of the sick. Exactly 100 Red Cross nurses are still on duty overseas, helping the struggle forward toward the high standard of American nurse efficiency in many countries. In the Government services 3,117 enrolled en-rolled Red Cross nurses are on duty with the Army, Navy, Public Health Service and the Veterans Bureau, while the entire active enrollment Is maintained as a reserve for the Army Nurse Corps and available to the Navy in a national defense emere-ency. Nine hundred nurses were added to tbe roll the last year. Red Cross nursing, however, has nerhans its finest exnression out in the places laid waste by fire, flood and storm, and in the back reaches far from the centers of population. In every ev-ery disaster the Red Cross nurse Is first called for, first to respond, and the last to leave her post of duty among the suffering victims. In the isolated sections of Alaska, North Carolina, Virginia, Idaho, and among (he bleak islands of Penobscott Bay, Me., her ministrations are making hard lives easier and working for a brighter future for the children. Her part in the human drama of the time is increasingly important, although it is subdued by the very nature of her work. The policy of the American Red Cross to establish under Chapter control con-trol public health nursing services in communities lacking such facilities has been justified and this pioneering work is everywhere endorsed by authorities authori-ties who are quick to take it over as a proper municipal function and a duty of taxpayers. The Home Hygiene and Care of the Sick program has further penetrated Into the schools as a definite defi-nite part of curriculums. During the year 29.000 school pupils took this Red Cross course. Three telephone corporations adopted It and graduated 960 employe students. As good health depends upon right eating the Red Cross Nutrition Service Ser-vice continued to promote individual and community health, particularly the health of mothers and children. This service reached nearly 150.000 persons during the year and found work to do for several thousand Red Cross volunteer volun-teer workers. |
